BUCHAREST, Romania – Romania's prime minister who is facing a corruption probe says he will return to Bucharest in two weeks after having knee surgery in Turkey.

Premier Victor Ponta has been criticized, including by members of his own ruling Social Democratic Party, for spending too long out of the country recovering from the knee operation.

Prosecutors say he is suspected of forging receipts for work he did as a lawyer from 2007-2008 while he was also a lawmaker and of receiving payments from another lawyer whom he later appointed as a minister three times. Ponta denies wrongdoing.

He told B1 television station late Sunday he would be back in Romania "without a wheelchair or crutches" in two weeks on doctors' recommendations after his June 15 operation.